Remembering the nine former NHLers who perished in Yaroslavl air tragedy

* * *

“This is the darkest day in the history of our sport.”
– IIHF President Rene Fasel

The hockey world has been shaken again, this time by the loss of an entire team, Yaroslavl Lokomotiv of the KHL, in a plane crash. The three-time champions of the Russian League and defending bronze medallists had an extra-large travelling contingent that was on its way to Minsk for the season-opener including, sadly, several members of the youth team.

While 43 distinct tragedies have taken place here, the names that strike particularly close to home to us over here in North America are those of nine former NHLers who were on board. Let’s reflect briefly on what those men accomplished in their hockey careers, which combined covered over 6000 NHL games among numerous international accomplishments:

Pavol Demitra (Slovakia) had a terrific 16-year NHL career, appearing in three All-Star games and receiving the Lady Byng Trophy in 1999-2000. Demitra finished among the top ten scorers three times during his heyday in St. Louis, topping out at 93 points in ’02-03. While he distinguished himself over an 847-game NHL career, I will best remember Demitra for his inspired performance at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, where at age 35 he led the tournament in scoring while very nearly willing heavy-underdog Slovakia onto the podium. He played especially brilliantly in both medal-round games, each a heart-breaking one goal loss to a hockey power. Demitra played at three Olympics and averaged over a point a game each time.

Assistant coach Alexander Karpovtsev (Russia) was a big but passive defenceman who often took more grief about what he wasn’t than credit for what he was: a minute-munching, puckmoving defender who played the angles and the percentages more than the body. One year after winning a gold medal at the World Championships, Karpovtsev had the honour of being the first Russian to have his name inscribed on the Stanley Cup, in part due to his alphabetical standing compared to NY Rangers teammates Alexei Kovalev, Sergei Nemchinov, and Sergei Zubov. As a group they utterly dispelled the foolish myth that Russian players didn’t have what it takes to win the Cup. Karpovtsev, who was the NHL’s plus leader in his best season in Toronto, ultimately returned to Yaroslavl during the lockout after a lengthy NHL career of 596 games.

Assistant coach Igor Korolev (Russia) played 795 NHL games over a 12-year NHL tour. Korolev was a finesse winger who topped out as a 20-goal, 50-point man with Winnipeg and again in Toronto. He loved his time in this country, and after five years residency he and his wife Vera became naturalized Canadian citizens. His best success, however, happened in his homeland; while the name of the league changed periodically, Korolev won six championships in the Russian league, five of them with the Moscow Dynamo powerhouse of the early 1990s. During the lockout, Korolev returned to his homeland where he played, and later coached, for Yaroslavl.

Head coach Brad McCrimmon (Canada) was a near-Hall of Famer in my books, certainly one of the most underrated players of his time. He ranks tenth all-time** in career plus-minus with a staggering +444 compiled over 18 seasons and 1222 games. (** stats maintained since 1967) He kept pretty heady company: the nine players ahead of him in this category are Larry Robinson, Bobby Orr, Raymond Bourque, Wayne Gretzky, Bobby Clarke, Serge Savard, Denis Potvin, Guy Lafleur, Bryan Trottier, Hockey Hall of Famers all and among hockey’s greatest stars of the post-expansion era. While McCrimmon benefitted from playing with some fine teams over the years – Boston, Philadelphia, Calgary, Detroit, before winding down in Hartford – the record suggests those teams generally got better when the rugged defender arrived and worse after he left. He twice reached the Stanley Cup Finals with Philadelphia where he and Mark Howe formed one of the game’s great defence pairings. While those Flyer clubs lost to the Oilers both times, McCrimmon finally won the Stanley Cup with the Calgary Flames in 1989.

Karel Rachunek (Czech Republic) had a relatively-short NHL career in this group, but still registered a not-insubstantial 371 contests. It was his lot to try to break in to one of the strongest young defence groups the NHL has seen in recent years, the Ottawa Senators of the early 2000s. He bounced between Europe and the NHL for a few years surrounding the lockout, including three different stints with Yaroslavl. Rachunek was a defensive bedrock and a key contributor to the Czech Republic team that won a surprise gold in the World Championships in 2010 and took the bronze this past spring.

Ruslan Salei (Belarus) hasn’t won any world titles, but he has represented his native country proudly both on the international stage and in the NHL. The hard-rock defender took an unconventional route to the NHL, leaving for North America when his club team Tivali Minsk was realigned right out of the Russian Elite League in 1995. He was so impressive in a season in the IHL that he was chosen ninth overall as a 21-year-old in the subsequent draft by the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim. He’s been an NHL regular since, playing 917 games. I attended one of the last of those earlier this year, when the veteran Salei, now a Red Wing, engaged in a spirited, game-long battle with the brash rookie Taylor Hall. He was about to play his first KHL game in many years in his hometown of Minsk, whose Dynamo were scheduled to host Lokomotiv tomorrow. What a terrible, awful homecoming.

Karlis Skrastins (Latvia) was another hardrock defender who managed the unlikely leap from one of hockey’s second-world countries to the best league in the world. Like Salei, Skrastins was an honest, hardworking defender who excelled at shot blocking and “taking one for the team”. He distinguished himself over a 12-year NHL career for his remarkable durability, breaking Tim Horton’s NHL record for consecutive games played by a defenceman before finally being hurt in game number 495-in-a-row. He wasn’t exactly what one would call a perimeter player, either. Skrastins ultimately played 832 big leagues, finishing up in Dallas in 2010-11 before signing on in Yaroslavl this summer.

Josef Vasicek (Czech Republic) also has his name on the Cup, a distinction he earned as a member of the Carolina Hurricanes in 2006, a year after he won a world title with the Czech Republic. Vasicek was injured for much of that ’06 Cup run, but he had earned his playoff stripes in 2002 when the 21-year-old played a crucial role in Carolina’s surprise cruise to the SCF. The big centre played an honest two-way game over a 460-game NHL career, and even a couple of years after he had left North America his name would come up in the blogosphere as the sort of player the Oilers should be recruiting. Since returning to Europe he had put together three strong seasons with Lokomotiv, leading the club in scoring in 2009-10 and finishing behind just Demitra last year. Vasicek was just 30 years old.

… and Alexander Vasyunov (Russia) was just 23. The New Jersey Devils prospect played 18 games in his NHL debut this past season after a three-year apprenticeship in the AHL, but had decided to return to his hometown of Yaroslavl for the upcoming season. His story was just beginning to be told when this tragic final chapter was thrust upon it.

* * *

It is a sad and tragic day for hockey, which has lost these nine men and far too many others. Requiescat in pace.

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the “X” in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.